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10
sleek
3y

i have been applying for jobs recently, and after getting some HR interviews that evolved to tech interviews, i just cancelled them all...

Every company seems to have hacker rank, and online coding sessions as tech interview stages which really stress me out. Its like everyone thinks they are google and its ok to make people go theough this pressure to join them.

I dont mind being given 10 days to implement a complex project, after which im either in or not. But 20 mins to solve something online while either the interviewer is watching me or the automated test is waiting to filter my application out... i get anxiety just thinking about that..

so im gonna stick with my current job for now, and focus on building my own business slowly on the side. I really felt anxious because of those tech interviews these past weeks and i feel so much better after cancelling all of them.

if a decent company comes along with the project approach, id love to apply, but otherwise ill just stick to where I am for now. dont know if im being immature or irresponsible career wise or if this decision will blow up in my face

stay tune to find out !

rant

anxiety

career

interviews

hackerrank

stress
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  • 1
    3y
    If its an interactive session they want to see how you reason around a problem, not necessarily a working solution.

    For any online test that needs to work I would expect more time.

    We also have a test but first its evaluated manually by us and we usually say they should spend at most a couple of hours on it but they have a few days so they can find time for it and also can do it in several passes with some time to think.

    And the solution has no “right” answer, and it need not be completed either if that which are shows promise.
  • 3
    3y
    @Voxera solution need not to have a right answer… sorry, that is bullshit. A candidate who studied artificial hackerrank bullshit will almost always be picked over cands who can not. I was dealing with more meaningful problems but reversing linked list under 20 min is better filor those hackerrank clowns.
  • 2
    3y
    @Voxera , @sleek , lately those tools are used at least in part to filter out bullshit resumes and titles.
    I've seen confident kids with bachelor degrees poop out on sorting tasks. Not specific fast algorithms, mind me. Just effective sorting, computing time be damned.
    @aviophile reversing linked lists would be great, but half the kids out there barely even know what it is, much less evaluate it.

    Our industry is at a point where there is just too damn much resumes to filter out and waaaay to few actual coders out there. And those are so busy that its just dumb taking an ginormous part of their expensive workday to go on live interviews.

    So, yeah, for harder, more brainy problems, people just want to know how your mind works, right answer or not. But those dumb ass hacker rank quizzes on basic ass programming are there just to filter out lame ass wannabe coders.

    Kick some ass on those basic quizzes and go for the real interview knowing you're part of the top 10% applicants already.
  • 5
    3y
    @Voxera agree with aviophile, almost all interviewers are expecting a standard answer. If a candidate provided solution in APL, I bet no interviewers will understand shit. Some interviewers are upset when candidates choose to use a language they dislike.

    Also, interviewers are expecting candidates to explain code while candidates are solving the problem. No developers talk to themselves while they code. The stupid interview process only gets you those hacks who waste time remembering leetcode solutions.

    It's so easy to predict candidates performance by reading their GitHub repos. Companies should just kick out all the HR/recruiters from hiring process.
  • 2
    3y
    Sadly based on the horror stories I read here, there are people who literally can’t code. I’m shocked at how they slipped through the cracks at college or bootcamp. I’m also shocked at how they were kept around for as long as they were without being fired after a few months. I agree there should be screening to test the basics followed by another interview to ask more advanced questions or possibly a small project that shouldn’t eat up too much time. asking for heavy mathematical leetcode questions using obscure comp sci data structures is stretching it big time
  • 1
    3y
    @h3rp1d3v At our company, interviews are done by devs if the team for the technical part, partly to understand the questions and answers and partly to get a feel, can this person reason about code in a meaningful way or are they just faking it.

    And our “problem” is not some simple algorithm or similar but a half done website that they are to complete a few features in.

    The language is always C# since thats what our existing solution is built in, and C# is listed as a requirement to begin with.

    Also, the test is not used as a first filter, rather its used after the first interview if we believe they are of interest. So its more to give some discussion material for second interview which is the technical part with the team members.
  • 1
    3y
    @Voxera good for you guys. I only get asked to solve stupid leetcode questions "in language of your choice".
  • 3
    3y
    @h3rp1d3v yeah problem solving ability can be measured without leetcode. Using a realistic test closer to an actual dev job tests both problem solving ability and familiarity with the language or framework they say they know.
  • 2
    3y
    @JsonBoa @Voxera yeah i get that but take this example for instance,

    ive done more react projects than i can count.

    A company sent me a hackerrank-style react test, it basically tells you to write react code to implement a calculator app, todo list, stuff like that. I got them all right.

    second interview with the same company, he made me write more react code, which i did.my code and logic was great... but there was some bug preventing it from running that i couldnt figure out due to time running out

    the interviewer told me "sorry i am gonna have to flunk you out, we can only allow working solutions to pass. you can re-apply in 3 months"

    so yeah, i wrote more react projects that i can count, yet flunked their shitty online react interview. That was almost 3 months ago but it really damaged my self confidence
  • 3
    3y
    @TeachMeCode yeah i agree. there are many shitty dev wannabes.

    company i work at didn't make me go through the hacker rank process tho..we had an hour long conversation, all techy stuff, basically they told me spill up everything u know šŸ¤£ and i was in šŸ¤·šŸ»‍ā™‚ļø why cant more companies do THAT ?

    another company i applied to just sent me a paper, saying how would you implement an app that does xyz. just give a detailed description of how you would implement the microservices and such. no need to write code, but if you do we are happy to review it.

    those are the types of interviews that should be used to filter out bullshit resumes. not a scary test with a countdown that filters ur application out of the HR system before people even talk to you
  • 4
    3y
    @sleek what an asshole!!! Seriously, he could’ve been more professional about it rather than “gonna flunk you out”. That was a test to see if you can code quickly in front of someone watching you like a tiger. How often do you come across that scenario in the industry? Almost never unless you work for a total dick. It sucks having to write code in front of someone bc a large percentage of your focus is on the interviewers and panicking over how smart they think you are rather than the problem itself. A few bugs is a dumb reason to disqualify you bc they could’ve been small things that you would’ve fixed easily. If he were good he would’ve considered your approach and thought process.
  • 3
    3y
    @sleek @TeachMeCode that type of "pass or fail" approach is what you get when you put someone who has no freaking idea what you are doing (those "JavaScript and java are the same thing, right?" people) to evaluate applicants.
    Then all they know to evaluate is "see if the clicky-clicky thingy goes play-play on the ugly giant phone"
    There is also the situation where teams put the lazyest and/or more annoying dev to evaluate applicants. Those mix incompetence with daddy issues and would rather say "no one passed" than use more than one bit to describe each applicant's level.
    So, for those "pass or fail" shmucks, just toss the software engineer unemployment stats at their stupid faces and go somewhere else. I would.
  • 3
    3y
    @sleek thats a bad reqruiter, even amazon accepts that there can be bugs, except in their online tests but those where not that hard to get working, the hard part was to get very good performance.

    Its the approach and reasoning that is important.

    This seams like someone thats in it for the power to say no.
  • 3
    3y
    I just look at people's projects and ask them about what they did, and why. They will either know what to answer or they will choke. Takes about 10 minutes.
    I get the leetcode interview stuff for companies with hundreds of applicants, but most companies aren't like that so I'm not sure why they go that route. The "see how you solve problems" phrase feels like a meme that everyone repeats because they heard it somewhere else.
  • 2
    3y
    @ars1 EXACTLY. Thank you sir
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